Christmas Decorations at Belle’s – the beautiful Shepherds Hut

Goodness can anyone out there please tell me how this happens every year. One minute it’s mid November and we are all wistfully thinking ahead to a wonderful Merry Christmas with plenty of time to plan and the next… we have three weeks left to create our Christmas. Three weeks. That is not very long at all and I still have so much to do. And so do many others I imagine. And sometimes it can be too easy to rush to the shops, buy a lot of stuff we don’t really need and over commercialise an event which by the very nature of its origins should be simple, natural and inexpensive. Ok, with maybe a dash of glitter. This week I thought I’d take you on a quick tour of Belle and show you her natural, vintage and homemade Christmas decorations, ready?…

Lets start at the beginning with the front door. Do you have Christmas decorations which come out year after year, you wander around the house for a while with them and then put them back in the box because nowhere quite worked? This rustic Noël sign is one of those. Heaven knows why I’ve never noticed its beauty before. Perfect Christmas decoration to greet visitors to Belles front door.

I decided on a red and ‘twig’ theme for this years homemade Christmas decorations because it’s traditional and because I have a lot of red I once favoured before I decided I was more of a neutral kind of girl. Once through the door you are greeted by natures heart wreath. The Spotty One and I collected bendy sticks and twigs in the woods on a recent sunny walk.

I separated the bundle into two and simply bent each bundle into one half of the heart. Then I secured the two parts with florist wire to create a whole heart. Last years leftover ribbon was tied at the bottom and a mini golden glitter bauble attached with another bit of wire and we’re done.

Staying with the twig theme, whilst we walked, I filled a blue Ikea shopping bag with a few more twigs and created a bough which is placed right in the corner opposite where I work and from where I can see twinkling lights whilst I write my stories. This homemade Christmas decoration is secured to the ceiling with rustic string and a few pins and decorated sparsely with a few more teeny baubles.

Here they are together looking beautifully rustic in their woodland home.

And then there’s this sweet little wreath made from super soft long and bendy shoots of something annoying growing in the garden. You of course can tell I have no idea what tree they are from…silver birch, willow maybe? They certainly look better as a wreath than on Mr M’s bonfire.

I had thought Belle would have her own Christmas tree this year. And then one day whilst cutting back the dogwood in the garden I decided I would make my tree instead. So I took an old glass coffee jar and filled it with sand and placed the jar in this vintage bucket. Then I cut dogwood and mixed together with more twigs positioning as a small bare tree might look. Next a small battery pack of lights from here were wound around the tree and red and gold mini baubles dotted about on the branches. Finally I added small red baubles which have been with Mr M and I since our first Christmas. They must be vintage then.  A little gold braid and a pretty clay tag are all that’s needed to complete these homemade Christmas decorations.

This collection of baubles from homemade Christmas decorations past, is from friends and loved ones. Together with a few new treats this year from lovely fellow Instagrammers, a pretty focal point is created which is hugely personal to me.

You’ll remember in this post Mr M bringing home a skip full of old books. One in particular had a mouldy front and back cover and really should have stayed where he found it. There was nothing wrong with the beautiful old and yellowed pages though. It was a toss-up between taking off the cover and using for styling in the home or reinventing a use for the lovely pages. I have a great many books for styling; the second choice won. I took pages from the hundred year old book and some cream card stock and using a Christmas tree stamp, I created Christmas Tree Confetti. I partially filled a small cellophane bag with the shapes and fine white glitter and sealed with a handwritten tag and small gold jewel.

This quick inexpensive craft would make wonderful hostess gifts, teachers gifts or you could even put small portions inside present wrapping or home-made crackers.

And finally when one is left with hundred year old paper full of Christmas tree shaped holes, what does one do? Well this one made this paper tree. My take on folk art homemade Christmas decorations. Complete with a jingle bell it does just that when the door is opened.

And thanks to natures gift of endless twigs, a few special baubles vintage and new and a little bit of twinkle and glitter, Belle is dressed for Christmas. Simply, naturally and inexpensively, just the way Christmas should be x